Thursday, July 9, 2009

If you don't know much about the Flaming Lips, it's hard to know where to start explaining. You could start with the live shows, complete with balloons, confetti, giant UFOs, and lead singer Wayne Coyne crowdsurfing in a huge plastic bubble. Or you could start anywhere in the catalog of strange and psychedelic music the band has put together over the last 20 years, including the brilliant The Soft Bulletin or the four-disc Zaireeka album. You could even start with the fact that, oddly enough, a band like this came from Oklahoma City. Personally, I think "Yoshimi" is a good place to start. The Lips' latest album, Embryonic is due out in September. Expect the unexpected.